Connecting the Classroom and Outside World

Educators, what are some strategies for connecting the classroom with the outside world?

NOTE: I’d like to share responses in my keynote at the iConnect iLearn Conference and on my blog and wiki. You can submit your ideas using the form below, share your text/audio/video reply in the Comments section of this post or respond to the corresponding Twitter and Plurk discussions. You can also view the compiled database of suggested strategies on my wiki, Learning Telecollaboratively.

This Afternoon at EBC

Diving Deep into Google Earth and Google Maps

Web 2.0 in Teacher Education (Program Info)

  1. My presenter notes
  2. Alternative to the term Web 2.0 is the Read, Write Web
  3. Teacher education and professional development that effectively helps teachers better integrate technology with teaching and learning
    • Allow the teachers to select their own goals and help them reach them
    • Online social networks can more easily provide the in-time assistance, coaching, mentoring, etc. that individuals during development/learning, but teachers often don’t think about using the networks
  4. How do we prepare teachers to teach in the 1-to-1 environment?
    • The emphasis should change from "teaching" to designing learning that engages the students.
  5. Resources for future teachers

Designing the 21st Century Global Learning Environments (Program Info)

  1. Building on some online discussion that has been ocurring for the past year here and here.
  2. If there were no barriers what would education look like? Brainstorming notes

This Morning at EBC

I’ll be updating this post throughout the day to alert you of things happening here at EBC San Antonio. The full list of sessions is here. I’ll be sharing information form the sessions that I’m attending. The session titles are in bold.

Social Networking for Professional Development

Scott Merrick is sitting next to me and streaming this discussion live.

  1. Should it be organized or self-forming?
    • Should the tool(s) be dictated?
  2. An atmosphere promoting risk-taking is imperative.
  3. Teachers know what they want to learn. Professional development should be tailored around them rather requiring them to attend PD in which they had no say.

Social Networking in the Classroom

Vicki Davis is sitting by me and is streaming this seession here.

  1. Teachers in the room are using Ning, Elgg, and several private online communities.
  2. Julie Lindsay and Vicki Davis updated us about the Flat Classroom and the Horizon Project.
  3. How important are digital citizenship and pedagogy in these decisions?
  4. If someone says a curse word in the classroom do we close the school? If there’s a fight at recess do we quit having recess? Why do we over react to these problems in online spaces?

EBC and NECC Preparations Underway

EduBloggerCon (EBC) and the National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) are just a few days away and I’m very excited about attending each. In addition to the great presentations and workshops I’m sure I’ll experience I’m looking forward to meeting many of the people from my online personal learning community (PLC) in person.

Here’s a bit of information about me and my EBC and NECC activities. I hope I see you in San Antonio.

Most of you have probably figured out by now that I don’t actually look like the image to the left, so I’ve included a photo of what I do actually look like in this post.

I’m a member of the NECC 2008 Nework at Ning and encourage everyone interested in K-12 technology integration to join this group regardless of whether or not your attending the conference. You can view members’ profiles and add them to your network. Visit my profile page to learn more about me and add me as a friend.

Drew Polly and I are presenting a bring your own laptop (BYOL) session Tuesday morning. The title is Integrating Virtual Manipulatives into Elementary Mathematics Classrooms and it promises to be fun, energetic, and engaging. Full details about meeting time and place are available here. We’d love to have you join us.

me07-500.jpgI’ve agreed to be part of the Diigo team’s EduDiigo presentation. I think there are many positive implications related to the rollout of this educational-friendly version of one of my favorite Web 2.0 tools. I’ll share the details of this session once I have them.

I also think I’m teaching a session as part of the NECC Unplugged slate of goodies. I’ll post the details here when I have them.

NECC Buzz Has Begun

It is still more than two months away, but I am already excited about this year’s National Educational Computing Conference. Although I will be co-presenting a BYOL (bring your own laptop) session about integrating technology in elementary mathematics, I am much more excited about meeting and visiting with members of my online social network in real life. I virtually attended last year’s conference via the RSS river that flowed out of Atlanta and promised myself I would not miss all the fun and opportunities in 2008. So, San Antonio, here I come!!!

Here are some of the events for which I am especially looking forward.

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EduBloggerCon/Classroom 2.0 “LIVE in San Antonio” 2008
Saturday, June 28, 2008
9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center

Pre-NECC Event following an unconference format. It is free and open to all.

See site for full details.

Tags: edubloggercon, ebc08, necc2008, necc08

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NECC 2.0
The Conference within a Conference. A Fringe Festival for NECC. Three days collaboratively created and scheduled by the participants, held in the open “lounge” areas during NECC.

See NECC 2.0 for full details.

Tags: necc2008, necc08